West Seattle, Washington
30 Thursday
The first area news story to break as West Seattle Community Garage Sale Day was winding down on Saturday afternoon happened to be a power outage on Harbor Island (original WSB story here). It left us with two followup questions, both of which have just been answered by Seattle City Light: First, a WSB’er asked, how could a Harbor Island outage involve 552 “customers” (since that means individual entities, not people)? SCL’s Mike Eagan explains the outage stretched along East Marginal Way a ways, too. Second, we wondered how just one seagull could cause that kind of trouble by landing on a “transmission line,” and before we could even make a call this morning to ask that, SCL’s Scott Thomsen read our comment and e-mailed:
A bird crashing into a power line would be unlikely to damage the line by the force of the impact. Birds cause outages by creating a new circuit when they touch two different lines. When such a short circuit occurs, it’s the electricity that does the damage by overloading the system. The bird is the connection that allows it to happen. When a bird lands on a single line and doesn’t touch anything else, they’re fine. You see this every day. The reason is that the bird is not creating a new, shorter circuit for the energy. The bird has a higher level of resistance to the electricity than the wire does, so the electricity takes the path of least resistance through the wire.
By the way, City Light’s outage page – including what to do if one happens, who to call, etc. – is here.
A few notes came in late Sunday night asking about an earlier incident involving police and a possible armed suspect at Hamilton Viewpoint (map). Southwest Precinct Lt. Ron Smith explains that just after 7 pm, officers answered “a call of a female pointing a gun” but upon arrival discovered the woman, in her 30s, was “practicing self-defense with a fake yellow handgun and a rubber knife.” He adds, “After the female explained to officers what she was doing and officers inspected the weapons in question, she was allowed to leave.”
Two weeks ago, we published a short report from the city Hearing Examiner‘s chambers in the Municipal Tower, after listening to arguments from both sides in the appeal of the decision granting “departures” crucial to the Denny Middle School/Chief Sealth High School co-located-campus project (rendering above). At the end of that hearing, deputy hearing examiner Anne Watanabe promised to publish her ruling in two weeks. Though the ruling is not yet available online, we got a call tonight from the person who filed and argued the appeal, West Seattle-based district watchdog Chris Jackins. He has received a copy of the decision and tells WSB that while the ruling upholds the city’s granting of the “departures” – allowing the project more height and less parking than city code otherwise would have required – he says “we did get two of the things we wanted”: One, a stipulation that the two schools’ start/dismissal times must be staggered by at least 30 minutes; two, a stipulation that a certified arborist be present for any future “tree removal activities.” (Jackins had documented the removal of trees on the site while a different appeal was still pending, as we reported last August.) “I’m happy about those two things,” he added. We will check with the Hearing Examiner tomorrow to seek a copy of the full ruling so we can add it here.
By Keri DeTore
Reporting for West Seattle Blog
If you drive down Avalon Way with any regularity, you may have noticed the office of Tillicum Village is shuttered. It closed after the Hewitt family of West Seattle, which has owned and operated Tillicum Village since 1962, sold the operation recently to Argosy Cruises.
Tillicum Village is a popular tour destination on Blake Island, directly across Puget Sound from West Seattle’s western shores, built in the style of a tribal longhouse, offering Native American entertainment and salmon barbecue to visitors; you can read its history here.
So what does the sale mean to its former owners, and the operation? We sat down to talk with Mark Hewitt, former Tillicum Village owner (and son of its founder Bill Hewitt):
It’s been a subject of enough controversy in Ballard that it’s been delayed a few months – but today it’s finally official, according to our fellow community-news-site operators at MyBallard.com: The SHARE homeless shelter that’s been at West Seattle Church of the Nazarene for more than a year WILL move to Ballard as originally proposed; the move will happen May 30. The move wasn’t certain till the results of a Ballard church vote were announced today. Here’s the full story from MyBallard.com.
Hours after the selling stopped at the recordsetting 180+ sale sites in the fifth annual West Seattle Community Garage Sale Day, the photos were still rolling in – from Sale #61, Rachel sent that photo of her fiance’ “the human sign” – below, from Sale #88, Janna and Julie‘s sale, we got a photo and the report that “Everyone had so much fun!”
And for some with leftovers, it was off to the Junction dropoff spot for Northwest Center and its “big blue trucks” — we spotted these two, and a third out of view, late in the afternoon:
Another option for leftovers – Nancy Woodland from WestSide Baby sent a request during sale day – which you might be able to help with, even if you were NOT a seller – read it here.
Later, there were the reviews — raves via Facebook and Twitter (see the mentions here). Even people who weren’t planning on being part of West Seattle Community Garage Sale Day found themselves pulled in, like Victoria, who wrote on FB:
I heard about this for weeks, but was not planning on selling or buying, until we started driving through the hood. Three hours later, we had a bunch of new (to us) books, lawn chair and dump truck. A very fun diversion.
Here are the links to WSB as-it-happened WSCGSD coverage:
Update #1 (7:59 am through 9:25 am)
Update #2 (9:26 am through 10:47 am)
Update #3 (10:48 am through 12:41 pm)
Update #4 (12:42 pm through 3 pm)
On the official WSCGSD site, westseattlegaragesale.com, we featured individual sales, photo by photo, some we took, some sellers sent. Just go to the site and scroll down to see the pix.
And a few people sent us “found item” notes afterward – we’ve posted them in the WSB Forums in their entirety — if you are missing keys, read this; if you are missing a box with money and children’s sunglasses, read this.
This was our second year as official coordinators of West Seattle Community Garage Sale Day, which was created by Megawatt, a community-connection nonprofit; when Megawatt announced in late 2007 that it was disbanding, we asked its leadership if they would consider turning WSCGSD over to us, and to our surprise and delight, they did. We have made a few logistical tweaks in those two years and are interested in your thoughts about anything more for next year – one thing we realized too late, we need to set up a place for prospective sellers and buyers to communicate before sale day – we did suggest fairly late in the game that sellers could come to the WSB Forums and post extra sale info, but that was sort of a stopgap measure. This year, with Twitter and Facebook in the mainstream, we used both – the former more than the latter – to communicate during-the-day sale info (scroll down to read our during-sale “tweets”); what would be helpful next year?
Last but not least, last call for the contests – Deadline to send in your photos (garagesale@westseattleblog.com) is 3 pm Monday – most creative sign, most unusual item bought, most unusual item sold. Each category has a gift certificate prize! Be sure you indicate the sale address, so we know it was related to an official WSCGSD event, and of course include your contact info. We’ll announce winners by Tuesday morning.
Mark your calendar for the 6th annual WSCGSD next year – the second Saturday will be May 8, 2010!
You may have seen this one in the citywide media – a teachers’ union saying that Seattle teachers were receiving a letter that in effect canceled their contracts, because of a change in how many “Learning Improvement Days” they’ll be working (1 instead of 2). Seattle Public Schools subsequently issued a statement last night saying, among other things (read the entire statement here) “The District did not send letters today to certificated staff on this topic.” Perhaps that meant they sent the letters some other day, as some teachers have indeed received the letter in question, like longtime Arbor Heights Elementary third-grade teacher (and Web guru) Mark Ahlness – who uploaded his to Flickr (see it here), as proof … it’s dated yesterday. KOMO TV has a followup online tonight, quoting West Seattle school-board rep Steve Sundquist as saying, “We are not firing all our teachers,” while district communications staff say they are “looking into” the discrepancy between the statement and the letter delivery. There’s a detailed discussion/dissection in this comment section on saveseattleschools.blogspot.com. 10:53 PM UPDATE: Checking the SPS website, we note that the district has posted another update online, explaining the discrepancy:
When the District learned this week that the Legislature would not be called back in session, we informed the Seattle Education Association (SEA) that the reductions in state funding would result in one less day for next year’s contract. The District and SEA have been discussing the impacts of reduced state funding for several weeks. We shared with SEA a letter we had prepared notifying their members that next year’s contracts would be for one less day than this year’s contract, or 181 days instead of 182 days.
Labor leaders informed the District on Friday of their intent to file an unfair labor practice against the District. We decided that we would wait until early next week to notify SEA members, allowing time for a more thoughtful discussion with SEA. In an effort to clear up confusion caused by WEA’s Friday press release that erroneously claimed the District had “fired 3,300 teachers,” we notified all of our staff that evening by email that reduced state funding would result in one less day for certificated staff next year.
While instructions were given that letters to teachers and other certificated staff should not be sent until early next week, we now know that some letters were mailed Friday evening instead of being held until early next week.
The fact remains that the legislature eliminated both authorization and funding for one Learning Improvement Day (LID), which means a reduction in funding of $1 million to Seattle Public Schools. In light of needing to fill an additional $34 million budget gap, we must in turn eliminate that LID day from next year’s contract.
We sincerely regret the confusion created for our staff this weekend.
Just got a call about police activity outside shuttered Fairmount Park Elementary (map). Scanner traffic confirms, police are investigating a burglary, apparently involving broken windows, which was the method of entry in previous break-ins, including this one four weeks ago. The school’s been closed for almost two years, but is being reopened for summer school this year, as we first reported here a month ago. As for tonight’s break-in, sounds like police have just finished searching the building but whoever broke in is no longer inside. (9:09 pm side note – We’ve also received a tip about police activity near Schmitz Park Elementary; haven’t heard yet what that’s about, however.)
A “medic response, 6 per rule” call — which usually means serious illness/injury — at 9th SW/SW Elmgrove in Highland Park (map) late last night is now explained on SPDBlotter — a 29-year-old man who had just gotten off a Metro bus was hit by a car, driven by a 51-year-old man described as displaying “signs of being under the influence …” Here’s the full writeup. ADDED EARLY MONDAY: CBgirl says in comments:
The guy who got hit is my roommate. He has multiple injuries (including a very badly broken leg), but thankfully not life-threatening. Very thankful, it could have been fatal!
The story has gone worldwide now, but thanks to Shannon Felix‘s original tip, WSB was the first news organization to report on the still-mysterious death of 27-year-old West Seattleite Jill St. Onge in Thailand, and we will continue to follow up, as family and friends search for answers and work to pay tribute to Ms. St. Onge. One of the newest developments: A memorial fund is now set up — according to this message from her family on the About Jill website (the image at left, of her and dog Sugar, is from that site):
We have set up a Jill St. Onge Memorial Fund. It will be used in a way we feel would represent Jill in the best way. Some ideas are starting a scholarship, establishing a memorial (Bench at a vista point or something along those lines) for every one to enjoy, helping other troubled travelers, using it to fund children art programs. This is very fluid right now. All thoughts and ideas on what would be a good way to represent Jill would be greatly appreciated.
Here’s a direct link to the page where you can donate, with your credit card, via PayPal (or PP account if you have one). Meantime, another update on the About Jill site says her fiance Ryan Kells (who works at Avalon Glassworks in West Seattle) arrived in the U.S. this morning, with Jill’s ashes. Results of the autopsy done in Thailand are not expected to be available for quite some time.
Other news is starting to break, just as West Seattle Community Garage Sale Day wraps up. Just got word from Seattle City Light that more than 500 customers on Harbor Island are without power, because of a seagull hitting a power line. Here’s the official news release from City Light’s Mike Eagan:
About 552 City Light customers on Harbor Island and along Alaska Way South lost power about 1:15 p.m. today. Most are expected to have power restored by 4 p.m.; the remainder within another three hours.
The outage was caused by a seagull hitting a transmission line. A City Light crew has been called in from home to replace a section of the line.
The Todd Shipyard was among those who lost power, as well as portions of Stevedoring Services of America.
7:20 PM UPDATE: According to the most recent update from City Light, e-mailed just under an hour ago, everyone has their power back except the site where the gull-vs.-line actually happened, the Burlington Northern Railroad yard; about that, Eagan writes, “A City Light repair crew was called in from home to replace the section of line and City Light expects power to be restored to Burlington Northern by 8:00 p.m.”
“Myron with the blackberry-whooper,” is how Sharonn Meeks captioned that photo, sent from the followup cleanup happening along a section of the “Gateway” stretch of the Fauntleroy Way end of The Bridge – sequel to the huge cleanup last September (as covered here), organized by the Fairmount Community Association. If you want to pitch in, they’re continuing till about 1 pm. Thanks to Sharonn for the photos!
Unrelated P.S., one more reminder of another way to do good today – Be sure your bag of nonperishable food is out for your letter carrier to pick up as part of the one-day-only Stamp Out Hunger food drive!
11:26 AM UPDATE: Another photo from Sharonn – Earl Cruzen, whose hard work helped pave the way for many special things around West Seattle, including Walking on Logs, which is part of today’s cleanup and the backdrop for this photo:
Sharonn notes Earl is still going strong at 89 AND despite the fact he’s recovering from a stroke a few months ago.
ADDED LATER: One last pic from Sharonn – the results!
West Seattle Community Garage Sale Day is of course far from the only thing happening today – the West Seattle Weekend Lineup has a TON of other events (see it here) – among them, an event to which you’re invited at the Vietnamese Cultural Center on SW Orchard just north of Home Depot (west of Delridge) – home to the sculpture shown above (as featured in this WSB story last year):
We are observing Memorial Day on May 9th to honor the 50,000 American soldiers who died fighting for freedom in Vietnam. Annually, the Vietnamese American Community gather around April 30th to remember the fallen soldiers of the Vietnam War. We invite you to join us in our traditional memorial ceremony this year.
RESERVOIR TOUR: We’ve been talking with Seattle Public Utilities for a while about setting up a tour of the reservoir-covering work at West Seattle (Westcrest) Reservoir, and today we finally got to take that tour. You’ll see the full story here within the next couple days, probably Sunday night if there’s no breaking news; the photo above is from inside the section that’s being covered, where concrete columns go up before the “lid.” It’s an amazing project, not quite as big as this one we covered at Beacon Hill last year; watch for our story.
COUNTDOWN’S ON: As of this afternoon, NASA has started the clock (see it here) running down to Monday’s scheduled launch of the shuttle Atlantis, piloted by West Seattle High School Class of ’72 alum Gregory Johnson (more backstory here). The launch is scheduled for Monday afternoon.
TOP 100 SEATTLE WOMEN IN TECH, THE WEST SEATTLE REPS: TechFlash published this list today and, as WSB Forum members pointed out before we’d even heard about it, WSB editor/co-publisher TR is on the list. Not alone in West Seattle residence, either – among the names we recognize, Patty Stonesifer, Vanessa Fox, Michelle Nicolosi, Shauna Causey. (Anybody else on the list who you know to be a West Seattleite? Let us know!) *Added Sunday night – thanks to the commenter who notes Joleen Winther Hughes is another West Seattleite on the list.
SPOTLIGHT FOR TONY’S: Hadn’t seen this till Seattle Weekly editorial exec Mike Seely, also a West Seattleite, mentioned it – his feature about Tony’s Produce, the beloved vegetable/fruit stand at 35th/Barton. Read it here.
SPEAKING OF SHOPPING: Wanted to showcase this post from the WSB Forums if you haven’t seen it already: WSB’er Kevin writes a detailed look at what’s available at Cash ‘n’ Carry, a potential Costco alternative.
First, from Karen in Admiral:
We had a prowler visit early this AM. I want people to know, because I live on a quiet dead-end alley. … Last night at 12:30 AM. My dog started to bark. It was raining hard. I thought it was lightning outside because I saw a white light in my bedroom. I stood up and looked out my second story bedroom window. Below I saw a blonde, clean-cut man in my garage with a flashlight. We made eye contact and he said something to someone else and split. They may have been caught in the act and didn’t have time to take anything. It appears that everything is still there. This took place (in the 3200 block of) 46th Ave SW [map].
Second, from Cheri in Sunrise Heights:
I just wanted to throw a warning out for anyone living in the 29th and Webster area [map]. Last night or early this morning my mothers car was broken into, they tore everything about as if to be looking for something specific. They only took a few dollars in change, only cause there was nothing else of value. They sure maid a mess though!! So remember to lock your cars!!
We checked in with West Seattle Hi-Yu Festival president Tim Winston to ask how construction of the “How Sweet It Is” float (Junior Court’s idea, as chosen last December) was going – since the float is scheduled to debut in the Sequim Irrigation Festival parade tomorrow – and he sent photos, along with this update:
As usual for Hi-Yu, the volunteers have been able to get just enough done, just in time. Float chair (& Hi-Yu VP) Deena Mahn completed the float with much help from her family and a crew of helpers. Life Church @ 35th & Cloverdale has been kind enough to allow us to do assembly in their parking lot.
We are using our current trailer, but hoping to enlist sponsors to allow us to order a new *enclosed* trailer soon.
We’ve reported on the fundraising drive before, here (contact info’s in this story). This float represents West Seattle in parades all over the region throughout the late spring and summer, including not only West Seattle’s own American Legion Grand Parade (here’s one of our stories from last year) coming up July 18, but also the huge Seafair Torchlight Parade one week after that.
You can go to college without leaving West Seattle – and if you don’t already know all about South Seattle Community College on Puget Ridge, a huge chance to find out during a one-stop-shopping event is just 3 weeks away – here’s the latest from SSCC about “College Night” May 28:Read More
Out of the WSB inbox, from Eric:
I had my small boat stolen last night from my alley in Arbor Heights (41st and 100th) between 8 last night and 7 this morning. It should be easy to spot and identify as it is bright yellow. The boat is a 1988 12 foot Duroboat with WA hull ID number WN-6743LD and the boat is yellow on top and aluminum on the bottom. It was on a galvanized (silver) trailer license number 2990TL. The trailer should be easy to spot as well as there aren’t too many boat trailers with small mismatched 8″ wheels (hey, I had a flat last week).
Another helpful ID point may be that the boat was upside-down on the trailer when stolen to keep the rain out. Most thieves aren’t know for their housekeeping skills so it is probably still upside-down on the trailer.
He’s reported this to Seattle Police, so if you call them with a sighting, they should be able to cross-reference.
By Jonathan Stumpf
Reporting for West Seattle Blog
In northern West Seattle, just north of South Seattle Community College on a 4.6-acre plot of land, a project is under development that upon completion will house a unique Chinese garden, the only one of its kind outside of China, and tomorrow is your next chance for one of its monthly guided tours, so we visited recently to see how it’s progressing.
The project is a collaborative work in progress between Seattle and its sister city in China, Chongqing and this site was chosen for its commanding views of the Cascades, Olympics and downtown.
The idea was first started in 1986 while then-Mayor Charles Royer was on a trade mission to Chongqing and 23 years later, the Seattle Chinese Garden — now a nonprofit organization—is slowly helping to bring this project into fruition.
What’s taking so long?
Thanks to the folks who e-mailed us a little earlier this morning to ask about a search, and sirens, in the Admiral area, 45th/Admiral vicinity (map). Lt. Ron Smith at the Southwest Precinct tells us that followed “a street robbery of a victim who was walking.” The robbers are described as four males in their late teens; K-9 joined the search but didn’t find them. Lt. Smith also mentioned another incident in the early morning hours — gunshots heard near Sanislo Elementary (map). He says “Officers responded and found three .380 cal. shell casings on the street. There were no reports of injuries, and no property damage was reported or found.”
Thanks to Alki’s David Hutchinson for sharing photos (top and bottom) of the National Day of Prayer gathering tonight at the Statue of Liberty Plaza — first time this event has been held since the plaza’s construction and dedication last year. (Following sentence and photo added 11:27 pm) Thanks to Sandi for sharing this photo of the Holy Rosary Children’s Choir singing at the Day of Prayer gathering:
Holy Rosary was among 10 local churches that participated in this event presented by the West Seattle Ministerial Association, and attendees weren’t deterred by the steadily gathering clouds:
Gatherings were held across the country – here’s the event’s official coast-to-coast website.
The mayor’s office just announced the draft Pedestrian Master Plan is officially available online — see it here. It includes various West Seattle projects such as the Alki Point sidewalk extension that’s being built right now, plus facts and figures (numbers on this page include: 2,256 miles of sidewalks in Seattle) and maps you can use to see how West Seattle stacks up (here’s the “potential pedestrian demand” map). You can give the city your comments (here’s how) through June 15, and a public hearing is planned June 21, before council action later in the year.
From just southwest of The Junction, Bill e-mailed in hopes that you might be able to help solve this crime:
I’d like to report a hit and run on the corner of Erskine Way SW and SW Dawson that happened (last night). The hit vehicle, a 2002 Saturn Vue, was parked in front of my house.
… My vehicle was hit from behind on the driver’s side. The bumper and tailgate was damaged and the tailpipe is broken. No paint was left but the damage to the other vehicle would have to have been to the front passenger side.
… Just one other note, a neighbor just told me that the hit and run occurred at 9:05 PM last night as he heard a “crash” but he was not able to get to his window in time to see the vehicle.
If anybody (else) saw or heard anything I’d sure appreciate it if they step forward.
He did call police, and reports a “cordial and professional” officer responded: “She collected evidence which included what looked like a signal light casing and it had a part number. She is going to try to trace the number.”
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